I wanted to update and clarify a few things about SF as summer (here in the northern hemisphere) ends, school and Uni starts again, and winter approaches and the holiday season approaches.
Why the upgrades and changes now?
We are upgrading and making some site changes at this time because google search algorithms changed. The search algorithms always look for the newest and most updated/secure sites and gives heavy preference to those sites so long as the content and topic match well. In the most recent update a little over a month ago it made a major change to the way it allowed sites that it decided were offering medical information without the benefit of Dr's or professional licensure. Basically if it thought a site gave medical information without actually coming from Doctors it buried the site so far in search results none can find it easily and it deemed SF was such a site. Further, it has declared forums are not trustworthy information sites due to the large number of forums with heavy advertising and therefore direct corporate sponsorship of ideas. Regardless of the fact we do not advertise at all, we are a forum so it still has dropped us substantially in any search not looking specifically for a forum.
What does Google Search have to do with SF?
While neither Google, Bing, Yahoo, nor any search engine has anything directly to do with SF, people that are not already members here that could use the support of a place like this cannot use us if they cannot find us/ do not know we exist. Our new memberships have dropped by nearly 50% since this algorithm change so we are taking the necessary steps to correct this so we can continue to be found by those looking for help - or perhaps more importantly- by those looking for suicide methods or ways to die that may find help instead and finally not feel so alone. If somebody is looking for help dealing with suicidal thoughts and feeling they can still find us and many places to help. If they are looking for ways to die we want to still be available as an alternative for them to consider as part of their researching online.
The steps we are taken, as outlined in @Freya 's post SF Changes and Upgrades will not only get us to our old levels but continue our growth and reach even further, as well as launching our new information only SF site that will happen this fall- suicidefacts.org . Without addressing the ability for for new members to find us we would go into a steady decline of membership such as happened a few years after several major changes until there was a small core group of dedicated member but very few new members. This reduces the amount of support available, fewer people to chat with, and less overall experience as a group to help people that need it. Within a few weeks after the new is updated we expect both to be easier than ever to find as well as a much faster and more user friendly interface with more options to customize SF than ever before for all of our members.
Donations and Site History
We have always been and will always be advertisement free here on the forum. We do this for many reasons, from trying to help protect members against extra unwanted sales type cookies that advertisements add to their browser, to ensuring it is easier to use the site and that there is no possible commercial exploitation of people that are need of help and that are already being taken advantage of by others in far too many cases. On a personal level I find it repulsive that anybody would use the pain and suffering of another human being as an opportunity for financial gain. Therefore all costs associated for running this forum have always been paid for by the site owners, admin, staff, and member donations.
The old site that some people remember from 2-3 years ago cost about $100 a month to run. The vast majority of that was paid directly by the former but still current admin @WildCherry for years, with some help from other key members, and in the last couple years she owned the site I tried to help some as well after I was an admin and learned details of the costs. Donations seldom ever were enough to pay costs and most months was her paying for a substantial percentage of costs from her own very limited resources.
When the update to forum software needed to attract new members (our current site design) was implemented, @WildCherry 's adaptive software was not updated yet and it was very difficult for her to use the new site effectively as needed to with primary responsibility for administrative functions and she "gave" SF to me, @JmpMster , to run on a day to day basis. The new software and updates which we paid for by making a Rule violation campaign used substantially more resources than the old site (think computer software or games from 2007 compared to 2017 and you have the exact issue of why more resources were needed to make the site load and run adequately. We went from a shared server place with limited bandwidth to our own high speed high end full server with bandwidth and resources enough for current and future growth as well as vastly increased security. The new costs however more than doubled, from $100/ month to $235/month.
Fortunately, membership way more than doubled as well making SF far more active and interactive again, and giving a much broader base for member and non member donations and support. This enabled us to cover monthly costs completely by donation for 17 months. In addition we have raised nearly $3000 towards a custom mobile app for SF members to use. Myself and my quiet and reserved co-site owner, @Freya have been able to put our personal resources towards social media advertising, renewing software licences, and other things while monthly costs were covered by donations.
In 2 of the last 3 months donations have not been enough to cover monthly costs and I have been personally covering the shortfall. Fortunately, between Freya and myself, we are able to cover the basic monthly costs anytime needed. There is virtually no chance of SF closing due to financial issues at this time. However when we are paying for the monthly costs there is little or no money available for updates and the every small extra expense becomes problematic over time. The shortfall is undoubtedly due to the lower traffic amounts, we have received almost no non-member donations in the last 3 months as the site traffic has fallen off in recent months due to the changes in google search, which had been paying about 25-30% of costs, as well as about 50% of total SF Mobile App development donations.
We are currently upgrading the site and making a number of needed changes to correct that issue- with the belief that the non-member use and donations (we often have had 10,000 people a month use the forum. Only a small percentage, slightly under half, are registered members, but others read and benefit from the experience of others just the same) will increase again. The total cost of upgrades and changes is nearly $1000, which @Freya is covering a large portion of and I am a slightly smaller portion personally. We have chosen not to do fundraiser to cover these costs because we do not want any donations that could go towards completing the mobile app to be lost to other costs due to the large number of people that have donated and are waiting on the mobile app.
If anybody is able to comfortably donate towards either SF Monthly Expenses or the SF Mobile App your support is greatly appreciated. Whether able to comfortably donate $100 , $50, $20, or even $2, it all helps and adds up. If every member that logged onto SF just this weekend donated $10 it would complete paying for the mobile app and cover expenses until the end of year. We have a lot of members so it does not take a large donation to help a lot if many people donate. Please only donate if you are able to without causing any harm or issues to your personal situation,. But consider a small donation instead of that extra pack of cigs, or the cup of premium coffee if you are able- it is greatly appreciated and to be honest needed at this time if possible. To any that are not able to donate- please have no concern or shame at all. I have been in that situation as well where $5 was a LOT of money to me, as have many if not most of our members. That is why we are a community and family- to help each other and support where we can as we can without any expectations.
SF Mobile App
We will continue to collect donations until the end of this year for the mobile app. At that time we will make a decision on how to proceed, whether to cut back on the scope of the project, continue to collect and save, or make other modifications based on the amount collected and member input. If we can get membership levels and site traffic up again before that time perhaps will reach goal by then and not be an issue to be concerned with.
Town Hall Meeting
I have held a SF wide meeting in chat early in each year just to give all members a chance to ask questions or make suggestions and comments on the upcoming year. Due to the number of changes and things going on right now , plus the start of the "busy season" for SF I am going to have an additional meeting open to all staff and members in our chatroom (we will make an additional chat room specifically for the meeting) on Saturday, Sept 22nd at 3PM Eastern Standard/ New York Time / 8 PM GMT/UTC (London) time zone and invite all staff and members to come talk and ask questions, or make suggestions, or address complaints, and get any and all updated information on the site changes coming up.
Why the upgrades and changes now?
We are upgrading and making some site changes at this time because google search algorithms changed. The search algorithms always look for the newest and most updated/secure sites and gives heavy preference to those sites so long as the content and topic match well. In the most recent update a little over a month ago it made a major change to the way it allowed sites that it decided were offering medical information without the benefit of Dr's or professional licensure. Basically if it thought a site gave medical information without actually coming from Doctors it buried the site so far in search results none can find it easily and it deemed SF was such a site. Further, it has declared forums are not trustworthy information sites due to the large number of forums with heavy advertising and therefore direct corporate sponsorship of ideas. Regardless of the fact we do not advertise at all, we are a forum so it still has dropped us substantially in any search not looking specifically for a forum.
What does Google Search have to do with SF?
While neither Google, Bing, Yahoo, nor any search engine has anything directly to do with SF, people that are not already members here that could use the support of a place like this cannot use us if they cannot find us/ do not know we exist. Our new memberships have dropped by nearly 50% since this algorithm change so we are taking the necessary steps to correct this so we can continue to be found by those looking for help - or perhaps more importantly- by those looking for suicide methods or ways to die that may find help instead and finally not feel so alone. If somebody is looking for help dealing with suicidal thoughts and feeling they can still find us and many places to help. If they are looking for ways to die we want to still be available as an alternative for them to consider as part of their researching online.
The steps we are taken, as outlined in @Freya 's post SF Changes and Upgrades will not only get us to our old levels but continue our growth and reach even further, as well as launching our new information only SF site that will happen this fall- suicidefacts.org . Without addressing the ability for for new members to find us we would go into a steady decline of membership such as happened a few years after several major changes until there was a small core group of dedicated member but very few new members. This reduces the amount of support available, fewer people to chat with, and less overall experience as a group to help people that need it. Within a few weeks after the new is updated we expect both to be easier than ever to find as well as a much faster and more user friendly interface with more options to customize SF than ever before for all of our members.
Donations and Site History
We have always been and will always be advertisement free here on the forum. We do this for many reasons, from trying to help protect members against extra unwanted sales type cookies that advertisements add to their browser, to ensuring it is easier to use the site and that there is no possible commercial exploitation of people that are need of help and that are already being taken advantage of by others in far too many cases. On a personal level I find it repulsive that anybody would use the pain and suffering of another human being as an opportunity for financial gain. Therefore all costs associated for running this forum have always been paid for by the site owners, admin, staff, and member donations.
The old site that some people remember from 2-3 years ago cost about $100 a month to run. The vast majority of that was paid directly by the former but still current admin @WildCherry for years, with some help from other key members, and in the last couple years she owned the site I tried to help some as well after I was an admin and learned details of the costs. Donations seldom ever were enough to pay costs and most months was her paying for a substantial percentage of costs from her own very limited resources.
When the update to forum software needed to attract new members (our current site design) was implemented, @WildCherry 's adaptive software was not updated yet and it was very difficult for her to use the new site effectively as needed to with primary responsibility for administrative functions and she "gave" SF to me, @JmpMster , to run on a day to day basis. The new software and updates which we paid for by making a Rule violation campaign used substantially more resources than the old site (think computer software or games from 2007 compared to 2017 and you have the exact issue of why more resources were needed to make the site load and run adequately. We went from a shared server place with limited bandwidth to our own high speed high end full server with bandwidth and resources enough for current and future growth as well as vastly increased security. The new costs however more than doubled, from $100/ month to $235/month.
Fortunately, membership way more than doubled as well making SF far more active and interactive again, and giving a much broader base for member and non member donations and support. This enabled us to cover monthly costs completely by donation for 17 months. In addition we have raised nearly $3000 towards a custom mobile app for SF members to use. Myself and my quiet and reserved co-site owner, @Freya have been able to put our personal resources towards social media advertising, renewing software licences, and other things while monthly costs were covered by donations.
In 2 of the last 3 months donations have not been enough to cover monthly costs and I have been personally covering the shortfall. Fortunately, between Freya and myself, we are able to cover the basic monthly costs anytime needed. There is virtually no chance of SF closing due to financial issues at this time. However when we are paying for the monthly costs there is little or no money available for updates and the every small extra expense becomes problematic over time. The shortfall is undoubtedly due to the lower traffic amounts, we have received almost no non-member donations in the last 3 months as the site traffic has fallen off in recent months due to the changes in google search, which had been paying about 25-30% of costs, as well as about 50% of total SF Mobile App development donations.
We are currently upgrading the site and making a number of needed changes to correct that issue- with the belief that the non-member use and donations (we often have had 10,000 people a month use the forum. Only a small percentage, slightly under half, are registered members, but others read and benefit from the experience of others just the same) will increase again. The total cost of upgrades and changes is nearly $1000, which @Freya is covering a large portion of and I am a slightly smaller portion personally. We have chosen not to do fundraiser to cover these costs because we do not want any donations that could go towards completing the mobile app to be lost to other costs due to the large number of people that have donated and are waiting on the mobile app.
If anybody is able to comfortably donate towards either SF Monthly Expenses or the SF Mobile App your support is greatly appreciated. Whether able to comfortably donate $100 , $50, $20, or even $2, it all helps and adds up. If every member that logged onto SF just this weekend donated $10 it would complete paying for the mobile app and cover expenses until the end of year. We have a lot of members so it does not take a large donation to help a lot if many people donate. Please only donate if you are able to without causing any harm or issues to your personal situation,. But consider a small donation instead of that extra pack of cigs, or the cup of premium coffee if you are able- it is greatly appreciated and to be honest needed at this time if possible. To any that are not able to donate- please have no concern or shame at all. I have been in that situation as well where $5 was a LOT of money to me, as have many if not most of our members. That is why we are a community and family- to help each other and support where we can as we can without any expectations.
SF Mobile App
We will continue to collect donations until the end of this year for the mobile app. At that time we will make a decision on how to proceed, whether to cut back on the scope of the project, continue to collect and save, or make other modifications based on the amount collected and member input. If we can get membership levels and site traffic up again before that time perhaps will reach goal by then and not be an issue to be concerned with.
Town Hall Meeting
I have held a SF wide meeting in chat early in each year just to give all members a chance to ask questions or make suggestions and comments on the upcoming year. Due to the number of changes and things going on right now , plus the start of the "busy season" for SF I am going to have an additional meeting open to all staff and members in our chatroom (we will make an additional chat room specifically for the meeting) on Saturday, Sept 22nd at 3PM Eastern Standard/ New York Time / 8 PM GMT/UTC (London) time zone and invite all staff and members to come talk and ask questions, or make suggestions, or address complaints, and get any and all updated information on the site changes coming up.
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